Discus | Fish Info and Photos

The Discus is a large cichlid from the Amazon River, its tributaries and flood planes, in South America. Discus and its variants were first described in 1840 by Dr. Heckel as Symphysodon discus, this name is now in use for the Heckel discus variant. The three "original" colour variants received their own name, the Green Discus Symphysodon aequifasciata aequifasciata, the brown discus Symphysodon aequifasciata axelrodi, and the blue variant Symphysodon aequifasciata haraldi.

The Discus today is an incredibly popular aquarium species and it is thought to be one of the most written about tropical fish, over a period of just 50 years. Although fish today are all thought to have come from the green, brown and blue discus in the wild, others colours are much more common in tanks including yellow, black and red. Today there is a major industry behind the captive breeding of discus, which primarily occurs in fish farms in a number of countries in Asia. They are relatively peaceful fish, co-inhabiting their surroundings with other, generally smaller fish that provide no competition for food. Today, the discus is listed as a Threatened species in it's natural habitat meaning that if the situation progresses unchanged, the discus will be at threat from extinction in the wild in the near future. Although many variations of discus occur in tanks around the world, population numbers of the original discus species in the wild are declining, primarily due to the decreasing quality of the surrounding water.

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